


Echoes of Doom & Dresses

by Kiiratam



Category: RWBY
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/F, Fluff and Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-03
Updated: 2019-09-03
Packaged: 2020-10-09 05:17:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20510243
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kiiratam/pseuds/Kiiratam
Summary: Taiyang has a chance meeting while grocery shopping.Takes place between Volumes 3 and 4. (My BMBLB fic index)





	Echoes of Doom & Dresses

"Mr. Xiao Long!"

  
Tai looked up from the shelves of cereal. An older woman with short, steel-gray hair was striding down the aisle towards him, shopping basket in hand. He inwardly groaned. Not _another_ person come to lecture him on 'your daughter's deplorable behavior at the Vytal Tournament'. He knew he should just try to escape, that he wouldn't be able to convince anyone what had really happened. But, like an idiot, he kept getting drawn into arguments. With _other_ idiots.

  
No, just people who believed what they had seen, and were scared. Which was the _other_ reason he shouldn't let himself be drawn into fights.

  
But it was Yang. He'd already put enough weight on her shoulders. He couldn't just let himself be lectured on why his daughter was a horrible person, and he had raised her wrong-

  
"Mr. Xiao Long. I thought I recognized you." They always started polite.

  
"Can I help you, ma'am?" Just pretend that civility was going to work.

  
"Oh, that's right. I'm sorry, we've never actually met. My name is Helena Sidero. I run a dress shop in Vale." So why was she in a Patch grocery store? And talking to him when he was trying to shop? Couldn't he buy Oooodlies in peace?

  
"Taiyang Xiao Long." He stuck out his hand. "Instructor at Signal. Pleased to meet you." And now that she's introduced herself, it's all downhill. Any second now...

  
"Yes, you have the same coloration as your daughter." There it was, a gleam of the hook. "But she has her mother's features." **That** was not the hook.

  
Wrong-footed, Tai asked in a harsher tone than he intended, "Excuse me?"

  
"Raven Branwen? Reds and blacks, loved silk, insisted on having very high slits in her dress for 'mobility'?" She shook her head. "No wonder she drove all the boys crazy. And plenty of the girls, too, but you know that. Didn't you also marry Summer Rose?"

  
Tai was reduced to blinking rapidly. "Um. Sort of?"

  
"Lovely taste in dresses, that girl. I really thought she was going to bring back capes for formal events, she wore hers so well." Smiling, Helena shook her head, "But there I go, nattering on. Forgive me, it's an occupational hazard. But both Summer and Raven showed me pictures of you in your suit back when all of you were at Beacon - you cut a very fine figure, if you don't mind me saying so - and seeing you has brought a great many memories back."

  
"I'm happy to have been of service." Tai managed to not turn that into a question too, but it was near thing. "But, and I don't mean to be rude, did you need something?" He did intend to be rude, somewhat. It wasn't often that he was ambushed by ghosts of Raven and Summer. At the same time. In slinky dresses. It only hurt to look back.

  
"Well, I don't, but you might. Or really, your daughter might."

  
That got his attention. "Were you making a dress for Yang? Or Ruby?"

  
"Ruby? I don't know a Ruby." She screwed up her face, thinking. "Oh, you mean the leader of Yang's team."

  
Tai nodded. "She's Summer's daughter."

  
"Oh, I should have seen that! She wears the same style of cloak and everything!" Helena shook her head. "No, no, it's about Miss Xiao Long. And it wasn't just you that jogged my old memory on that."

  
She pointed at a bare section on the cereal shelves. There was a small placard that read, 'Due to unforeseen circumstances, Pumpkin Pete's Marshmallow Flakes are temporarily unavailable.' Tai wondered who had made _that_ call. It certainly hadn't been the manufacturer, who would, at the least, have to re-box all their stock. Have to find a new mascot, now that everyone was trying to pretend Pyrrha Nikos hadn't existed.

  
Helena kept on talking, "Miss Nikos and her friends, including your daughter, came into my shop a few days before... before."

  
A dim memory rose in Tai's head. "The dance after the Vytal Festival."

  
"It always seemed odd to me, having a dance _after_ everyone else had finished celebrating."

  
"Rotate your watches." It seemed obvious to Tai, but...Helena wasn't a Huntress. She just looked up at him blankly. "You never have everyone sleep - or party- at the same time. Someone's got to keep an eye out. It's-" He struggled for the words to describe it. "It's not the most obvious of lessons, but it reminds students that they aren't just normal people, who can go off and celebrate."

  
"Oh." She thought about that for a second, then jumped back on her previous thought. "But your daughter and her friends all came by and ordered dresses from my shop. And I haven't exactly had much else to do, since my daughter insisted I evacuate to Patch. And I just hate leaving work unfinished."

  
"I..." Tai closed his mouth, tried to put all the words in their proper place before speaking. "I appreciate the thought, and all the effort you must have gone through, but I don't think my daughter needs her dress anymore. And-" He blew out a breath, pushed forward. "Yang was badly hurt. She lost an arm."

  
"My word! I am very sorry to hear that." Helena shook her head. "But... it's not just your daughter. I know Miss Nikos is beyond us now, but do you know a Nora Valkyrie or a Blake Belladonna?"

  
He nodded. "They're friends of my daughters."

  
"Do you have any idea where I can find them?"

  
Tai blew out another breath. Nora was gone with Ruby, somewhere on the road to Haven. And Blake, who Yang had suffered for, who Yang had loved, had vanished. Just like Raven. He was starting to think there was a curse on the Xiao Long family name. He shook his head. "No, I'm afraid not."

  
"Do you think you'll see either of them again soon?"

  
"I hope so." If only to give Blake a piece of his mind for hurting Yang so badly.

  
Helena smiled at him, clinging to her little shred of hope. "I know you think your daughter doesn't need her dress, but Miss Nikos already paid for it, and it would be a shame for it to just collect dust on one of my dress racks. Would you mind terribly if I left all four dresses with you? And if your daughter, or Miss Valkyrie or Miss Belladonna need them fitted again, I'll happily do the work for them."

  
"Mrs. Sidero, it's not that I don't appreciate your offer. But-" Tai opened his hands. "Why?"

  
"Well, delivery was part of the fee, and I _said_ I hate to leave a job unfinished." She looked directly at him, with a suddenly fierce gaze. "And it's one last thing I can do for Miss Nikos. She deserved better." She swept her hand back at the empty cereal shelf. "I don't care what the footage says. Miss Nikos was a hero, and she would never do anything like that. And neither would your daughter. And I tell that to everyone. And will keep doing it, until everyone gets it through their thick skulls." Helena dropped her gaze. Added, in a softer voice. "I'm only one old woman. I'm not a Huntress, just a dress-maker. Please, let me try to help."

  
Everyone was hurting. Not just Yang.

  
Tai nodded. He could surprise Yang with it when she was doing better.


End file.
